[1:07] [Brad] Welcome everyone to today’s special online event, LinkedIn, China, how to advertise B2B the smart way. So in today’s session, we’ll share with you a stack of information around LinkedIn, China, and of course, B2B advertising.

So we’ll cover differences between LinkedIn, China, and LinkedIn global versions, some of the best practices and some benchmark data and what the customer journey looks like. And we’ll also share with you lead gen for beta bees in China, and a little around how you can go about. Using our platform to do advertising on LinkedIn in China.

I see a question. How long is this session? Roughly 60 minutes is the answer to that. Well, I’ve said it before, and I’m sure I’ll say it again, but there’s little benefit in you attending webinars and not using what you learned. And so we do these education sessions for free to help you do exactly that

So please take notes, make dot points and importantly. Determine what your next action steps are that come about from today’s session, because if you do, you’ll be able to clearly see what your next steps and what your priorities are at the end. We’ll do a Q and a as we always do. And you can ask your questions now

Or anytime that they come up during the session today and we’ll make sure we get to absolutely everything. And if there’s too many questions, well, of course we’ll follow up by email. Nothing is too specific. So ask away about absolutely anything that is of course, related to advertising and selling in China.

[2:47]Now, before we get into it, let’s introduce today’s speakers today. We’re joined by human from the ad China IO team. You might have a major focus in our team on the data and analytics in marketing campaigns and identifying leverage points and opportunities based on that data. Brad and I work at China IO as well, and I put together a lot of our educational content around the tech, the tools innovations.

In the world of Chinese advertising and handle a lot of our communications across email and social, presenting today as well is Henrik a serial entrepreneur and China marketing expert. Now towards the end of today’s session, Henrik, we’ll be joined by Jay. Jay is our CEO and co-founder with extensive experience building international teams and businesses across Europe and Asia.

So Henry and Jay will take over for the Q and a at the end. As I mentioned earlier, we love doing the Q and a sessions and we’re used to going a little over time just to make sure we get every question answered. And if you’d like to get specific and ask right about your industry, your organization, your niche, please go ahead.
We’re happy to be specific and address your industry or your vertical in particular. And we can do that because we work with a lot of organizations across the spectrum in this case of database. Now, to explain a little bit about who we are and what we do at ad China IO, we help organizations, brands, and businesses to get set up and start advertising and selling into China.

And just to be clear, we are a tool first and foremost, and you’ll see that a little bit later, but we integrate with the top media channels in China and the platform lets you run ads entirely in English. And so often we get asked and yes, we can do the campaign strategy and the support side of things.
And we offer that in some of our subscription packages, but if you’re already working with an agency, it’s totally fine to keep working with them. We can be the tool that you use to run the ads and to deliver the reports. And you can see all that data in an open, reliable, transparent way. And you can continue to work with your agency partners on the strategy and the campaign side of things.
Now, with that said, I’d like to introduce Henrik, to kick things off and talk about. B2B lead gen in China. Take it away. Henrik.

[5:22][Henrik] Thanks for the introduction. And thank you everyone for joining us today. very happy to see, see so many people here. So, in China is, it’s very, very, it’s very interesting.
it’s very, exciting. It’s a very exciting time for it. And I think it’s something that’s very close to heart to our mission as well. Our, mission with both digital, China and China is really to, through. Encouraging trade, be a force for good in, in the world. And I think one of the ones that best ways of.
I would say overcoming cultural challenges, misunderstandings and things like that is for businesses to do, business cross border.

Now, when it comes to B2B leads generation in China, it is a little bit different than what it is in the rest of the world. So for example, one, one major challenge is that it has a completely different ecosystem.
So for example here, this is what an international B2B leads generation, looks like. You know, you have Google, you have bang, you do paid ads on maybe Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, you know, around social media. Under other, we have, you know, influencers, we have email offline it’s TV, and also in-person, you know, events, expos, industry gatherings, out of these, you know, which one are available in China.

Actually the only ones that are available in China is LinkedIn and the offline events like expos. LinkedIn is actually the only channel internationally that has been able to, find a way to properly operate in, China. and that’s why we’ve decided to dedicate a full webinar, focused on.

LinkedIn for B2B leads generation. The other one is of course, expos, and I think that’s something that, businesses selling to China tend to be more familiar with. now it’s, I think it may be it’s still ongoing or just finished the China import ex international import expo. I think it’s just wrapping up.

[7:56]But looking at the Chinese lead generation, it’s a completely different picture. You see for search, we have different channels for paid ads. Almost everything is different, except for LinkedIn. Same on social media. The reason why. I also cross over all the here is that’s the influencers that work internationally are not the same influences that work in China.

And also just in general, the whole, like influencer industry is very different. In China. The other thing is actually in China, people don’t use email as much. So there’s more, I would say more it’s done through, through mobile phones, some with SMS, but a lot of it is just done through, through we chat and other instant messaging.

Of course there is TV in China as well, but since it’s completely different channels, we don’t count that as the same, as the same channel either. So this is like, you know, the first. Major challenge for B2B lead generation in China is, you know, around the lack of knowledge of, of the, ecosystem.

Then there’s also, for many, it’s a lack of access to the market due to the culture, new to the language. we also see. A lot of companies have a little bit what we call the, like an expo dependency, meaning that they are very good at going to, events. they would show up to the expo so they would get, you know, a strong amount of leads, some good deals.

[9:35]Going on from that, but they don’t say they’re not able to consistently generate, you know, a lead funnel from China. And you know, this is especially a challenge now during COVID, when it’s so hard for a lot of, a lot of businesses to even get to China, Another challenge can be those who work. We call them like work blindly with a joint venture, meaning that they do have a local presence, but they don’t really have the insight into what’s going on, what’s being done. And then finally is, you know, it’s the high starting costs and risks that has traditionally been associated with, B2B leads generation in China. On the other hand side, which is why I think a lot of you are here today. It’s the opportunities, right? It’s the scale. Just the number of companies that are available in your industry, pretty much in every industry in China and also the size of the opportunities, within those companies.

Then it’s also the growth. So the B2B market in China is estimated to grow a 30%, per year moving forward towards 2024. And of course, a lot of this, growth is likely to go to domestic companies as well as there is. Fierce competition in China, but there is a lot of opportunity for strong, international businesses, to conquer a lot of market share in China over the coming years.

And this is also, you know, with the challenges around the world due to the COVID to do is to slow down in the economy. China actually had a very positive growth rate in Q3, and we expect to see a positive growth rate in Q4 as well. So it’s one of the markets that are actually continuing the growth.
then the third opportunity is around the digital digital digitalization, which is that, you know, it used to be that in order to succeed in China, you’d have to find a local partner. You know, you have to find someone with a little in Quincy, some relationship and build it through there and you know, was focusing, Was focusing on, you know, catching the one big fish.
now thanks to the digitalization of China. the Chinese companies are also evolving in the way they do business and it’s becoming more and more.

International, similar to the way that we would do business internationally, with possibilities to, to both due to sales and negotiations, you know, long distance, the possibility of starting out with, other smaller deals and then growing from there.

[12:38]It’s really the business culture has seen a lot of development in China over the last few years. And also around that feel free to ask any questions you might have, in the chat. Jay is with a here today. He has, some fantastic, experience, you know, that he can share with us. number four here.
I see, I forgot to update the, I forgot to update the, the slide. So my apologies for that, but number five is supposed to be the fourth point here, which is run, lowering, start lower starting costs and risks. So thanks also to the digitalization we talked about and also new tools like. For example at China, the starting costs to enter the Chinese market has gone down a lot as an example, to start doing LinkedIn, advertisement in China.

Traditionally that has been, you know, 50 to a hundred thousand us minimum. Just to get an account up and running and be able to run that. now with China, we’re able to get it started for around five to 6,000, us dollars. And that’s not the cost. I mean, that’s the initial budget. so this also lowers the risk.

And since, since now there is a lot more, also how does a smaller deals, meaning at night mouth be with the, you know, the top 50 companies in China, but you know, the, all the small and medium sized companies are starting to do more international business, which means that, you know, there’s a lower risk associated with going into China.
So it’s based on these challenges and opportunities. We wanted to delve deeper into LinkedIn China, because a lot of companies have experienced advertising on LinkedIn internationally, because of others, because of all the great things with LinkedIn ads in general. but doing LinkedIn ads in China is a little bit different and that’s what we’ll get into now.
So with that, I hand back over to Brad. To talk a little bit about the key differences between LinkedIn in China and LinkedIn globally.

[14:55] [Brad] Well, awesome. Thanks. So the differences between Legion inside and outside of China. So now yes, I’d like to jump into the key differences between LinkedIn, China and LinkedIn global versions.
So LinkedIn, China is a separate self-contained sort of ecosystem. It can’t be accessed. Through the global version of LinkedIn. And by the same token, it can’t access any content on the global side either. So it’s one of the few major platforms that have created this sort of split version to satisfy the Chinese government’s requirements around center censorship and so on.

So that said it’s about 98% similar in terms of the interface, the features, the look and feel updates and the developments. So to advertise on LinkedIn, China, you need to follow LinkedIn’s general rules that are applicable to everyone on both versions of LinkedIn, pretty standard stuff. You also need to follow LinkedIn China’s specific rules involving not advertising, you know, animals or animal products, credit card, cash out services, debt collection services, and a few other ones that are a bit more obvious.

And then on the third layer, you also need to abide by the local Chinese advertising law, which is around not using superlatives and not referencing your products by their nationality, claiming that they’re the best claiming it’s, you know, Finland is number one. Whatever the product happens to be. So am I understanding is this is that you can say where it’s from and it’s probably required by consumer law to say where it’s from, but it’s about how you position it. So you can’t claim to have, you know, the best bananas in Portugal or Brazil or wherever.

[16:47]Another requirement is that to start advertising. The channel wants an initial deposit to confirm that you’re serious. So all of the top channels in China do this. So they want that deposit and you don’t have to spend that all in one place or all at once on one campaign, anything like that, they just want to know that you intend to give advertising a proper shot and it makes it worth their while to process.

And. A preview to run ads on their platform because at the end of the day, the channels are responsible for any violations of the law. And so every ad is manually reviewed to make sure that it is in line with our requirements. So another great reason to use LinkedIn. And advertise on LinkedIn, China is that it has the third, most active LinkedIn users of all countries, roughly 50 million users.

I’ve seen some sources say 48 others, 56, in the last year or so it’s somewhere around 50 million, which is pretty impressive. So, what are the key similarities then between LinkedIn, China and LinkedIn global? Well, for one, they’re both really great at targeting professionals and selling beta B. So similar to the LinkedIn global version, it puts you in touch with a huge number of decision makers and industry leaders and experts.

And the placements also are the same, and you’re probably used to those as well, but let’s take a quick look at those. So you’ve got sponsored content, which is your typical posts that’s promoted. And you’ve got your copy, your link. And of course the image and more or less behaves, just like a post, except the people who meet the ad criteria see it rather than the people who are following your page. Of course, you’ve got the LinkedIn InMail messages where you’ve got the title, your profile picture, subject line. And of course the body message, which you can see kind of grayed out behind it. There, you only pay if your message gets delivered, which is really cool.

[18:55]And this lets you get into the inbox of those people who are most suitable. So you can identify the people that you want to send the messages to. And message them with those InMails. And finally you have the lead gen form, which is for your guests, that collecting leads. So you’ve got this display that comes into the feed and a thank you box when someone signs up and you can collect the first name, last name, email company, phone number, job title.

And I think there’s a few other things as well.
So on the pricing, it works pretty much the same as global with the CPM and the CPC for impressions and clicks, respectively and the CPS, which is the cost per cent on those InMail messages. And as I mentioned, Those are more cost per delivery in how the pricing works in that you pay. Once it is delivered.
Now, LinkedIn, China is exactly the same as the global version in that it consists of the posts, the interact on your posts and a mix of. Content types and doing those is highly effective. Now that said video is one that is working extra well, I’d say, lots of platforms that are promoting it a little bit more and it gets more engagement.

So once you do have enough of a following to start doing the organic marketing follow is video is a great choice for that. And on a similar note, if your landing page is very well optimized, if it’s hosted in or loads fast in China, and if your copy is nicely translated, that’ll improve your performance as well.

Now your ad performance is going to primarily hinge on how well your target audience has set up. Assuming that there’s a market for your product or service in China, you need to connect with the right people who want to use it. So small test campaigns really are the way to achieve and identify that in a leveraged and fast way.
So let’s get into a few of the best practices when it comes to advertising on LinkedIn, China. So on that topic has really nothing too special or too unique about LinkedIn shine or ads compared to regular LinkedIn ads. So what actually matters is whether or not you’ve done the strategic and the foundational groundwork. So what matters more than anything is how well, you know, who you want to target and how precisely you can, identify them. 

[21:48]Well, as I’ve mentioned, the strategies and tactics and the nitty gritty of LinkedIn advertising is pretty much the same in China. If you know LinkedIn ads inside and out, then you’ll be. Pretty much just as effective in China, assuming your marketing is of course, culturally adjusted and translated into Chinese.
What you need to know is what you need to do is to research and. For lots of small to medium budget tests, find out and now down exactly who your audience are, who you want to target and the criteria that will allow you to reach them specifically. Now they say in life that the quality of your life is based on the quality of questions that you ask yourself.

And in a very similar way, the quality and the results of your marketing efforts are based on the quality of questions you ask as well. So to help you do that, here are a few questions that we ask new organizations that are working with us to figure out and dial in some really great targeting. So what’s the size of the industry.

Does the government value or consider it important? And where are the related clusters located? And that one is extremely important. So in China, there are particular regions that focus on certain manufacturing or product speciality. So all of the companies that focus on particular goods, likely clustered together.
Or there might be multiple clusters for some verticals in a few different cities.

Now, the point here is if you can identify those, then you have massive advantage when it comes to targeting that lets you reduce your costs massively. Instead of advertising across the whole of China, you target the three, four, five, six cities that have a very high.
cluster related to what you’re selling a high incidents of businesses that are wanting what you have. And that’s the major advantage that lets you get high clicks and low cost per click. And another quality question is which industries are contributing to growth and where are they located? When I say to growth, I mean growth around the.
Product or service that you’re selling, because chances are, there’s an overlap with that last question.

[24:17]And from there, you can create lookalike audiences with organizations that you’ve never heard of, but you know, that they’re a match because they also have some of those key characteristics that you’ve identified already. And from there, it just snowballs.
So really I think the best tip that I can give is to know, and to understand deeply your ICP, if you know your ideal customer profile and have that documented and defined when you have your strategy and your fundamentals ready, it becomes so much easier and to succeed and to run ads that really drive growth and drive results.

So the last point I’d like to make before I hand over to your mind, is that when you get enough traction to be doing organic LinkedIn marketing posting, without paying that is actual, that you’re able to get some engagement in that crucial 30 to 60 minute Mark. Because when the algorithm detects positive responses to your content, or really any responses, you know, likes comments shares, it will propagate that out further and put it in front of more people.
And again, it does exactly the same thing on the global version. Well, that’s everything I wanted to cover. So now I’ll hand over to your mind. To talk about the B2B customer journey. I remember if you have any questions to please put those into the chat and we’ll get to those at the end, take it away Yunman.

[25:54][Yunman] Thank you, Brad. so. LinkedIn ads can be a good kick starter to latch your brand and service. No in China’s business community, it can lead the audience to the complete website or the ads or social media presences in the consideration consideration stage linking has also the lead generation function from the lead, from the leads that show from the lead form that brusher earlier, and that can lead to, that can be used to.

In the decision stage in the customer journey, this slide shows the different functions that ads can offer in different stage. the STEM as LinkedIn global, it can help to build brand awareness, sponsor content, increase the, website visits, engagement, and others through the landing page and also the degeneration and the conversion.

And. I think the ad is very suitable for, for people who already have a very clearly defined target group, because it can, it is based on the real profile data of the person. And, it’s have a very good target ability to target audience by the industry company B the dysfunctions are real and something else.
And next is the bidding strategy of LinkedIn ads. It has three masters too.

Feeding the first two, automatic optimization, buys the overall budget or the campaign objective, for example, how many clicks you want to get from the ads? And the third one is the manual bidding. The price for manual bidding is the CPC price for manual bidding is normally higher than the automatic optimization.

[27:46]In the case that if you want to boost the brand awareness, you can try to use the manual bidding. But normally we suggest to use automatic, automatic optimization and the, the minimum daily budget for LinkedIn ads is 1000 sale Y per day. And this price is, Significantly higher than other channels in China, but because it has the more precisely targeting function.
So it’s very worth trial. If you have a very clearly defined target group and this page shows the benchmark, they job in China, the city are. Of LinkedIn, China ads is a wrench around the reports 3%. And the engagement rate is around 0.4%. The engagement rate is a sum up of the clicks and the likes comments shares
and others.

And, this slide shows, it community size of, LinkedIn, China users and different industries, were, is that, most, most industries are, most people are in the manufacturing industry and the second big. Biggest group is a government and followed by finance and the, some others. the S the things that this is relevant to you is that the bigger target group you have on the LinkedIn channel, the lower CPC you can normally achieve.

[29:21]And this the lives, shows a customer success story that we have recently. we have a client from the environmental technology industry and they want to target, industrial and the government decision makers and researchers for their, for their brand and their websites and the aware, the objective for this.
For this campaign is to post the brand awareness of the brand of the company and also the traffic to the company website, the ad placements where yours and this campaign is the sponsor. The sponsor compare the sponsor content of LinkedIn, which is the, hubs, information flow ads. We have. And, the, this campaign rich more than 16 million people and, choose, more sun six times higher than the average for the state you are.

And also, 60% lowers and the average CPC, because, because of the reason that’s broad mentioned before the good content also rich, always lead to a best, to a better result. And that’s, that’s all from me. let’s hand to Henrik for the
demo.

[30:45][Henrik] Would you please let me know in the chat that you can see my screen, someone, and then I’ll then I’ll continue just to make sure. Yes. Thank you very much, Susan. yeah. So now we’re inside a demo account of ad China IO. So I’m just going to quickly click in through, and you can see here all the channels that are available through, I, China IO, everything from the Tencent channels, such as we chats Tencent video.
Through to both Baidu feed, meaning display, and also Baidu search engine marketing, meaning the keywords like Google AdWords but today we’re focused on LinkedIn. So let’s, focus on, imagine that we’re setting up a lead generation campaign. I’m just going to select a single image and just to keep it simple.

And on the example, landing page, then we come into the, targeting. So a couple of the things that were mentioned now on, on the, in the webinar, one being, around music software. So in LinkedIn ads in China, you can select, of course we have the location, we have the age, the gender. Then we also have things around education around industry, and also interests.
so for example, if we look at, I would say if we look, soft, where I think I saw one specific here, Yeah, everything from, you know, the sign software to open source software, but I thought I saw one related to, to music earlier after the question. So editing, let me see. maybe that’s on another one.

[33:22]Okay, so then let’s pick another one. one was around, for example, with food and a food and beverage around. so for example, here, looking at fields of study for, food and beverage sales. So one thing is targeting people who have worked within, or education, studied things related to food, science and technology, you know, foods, nutrition, Food service system, administration management, like there’s so many fields of study.

We can be very, very specific around that. and it could also be, you know, related to, related to, degrees, Taking, for example, such as, we, we are working with quite a few, law firms, that wants to get new clients from China. we also working with things actually somewhat within a medical space. of course. Very interested in targeting doctors. we have, although say components, manufacturing, people working towards infrastructure.
So targeting people who are interested or who have the grease within engineering, who have masters or doctors, within that,
That could also be, you know, around, infrastructure. so is there any other specific questions around this? and this is just to show how easy it is to use. So it’s, it’s really just depending on, you know, what’s your target audience?

what do you know about them? Who do you want to target? And I think that’s always been, you know, the, the strong. capabilities that LinkedIn has is its users and how much it knows about their, about their careers.